Maple Syrup: The Other White Sugar

Guest blog, Faye Conte, 3SquaresVT Advocate at Hunger Free Vermont

I love to bake. This is a dangerous hobby, because I also happen to have a killer sweet tooth. Fortunately, my friends, family, and coworkers are usually happy to help me polish off my latest pie experiment of batch of cookies. However, I often feel a pang of guilt when I pawn off treats filled with butter, sugar, and white flour to people who I know are trying their best to eat a healthy diet. Time spent in my kitchen quietly sifting and measuring out cups of flour is grounding and rejuvenating, and not a habit I want to give up. So, this year, I’m taking a different approach to baking. This year, I’m filling my baked goods with the healthiest ingredients I can and learning how to bake things that are more pleasure and less guilt. I’m learning how to sneak in bananas instead of butter or oil, how to replace white flour with whole wheat flour, and how to cut down and replace white sugar with alternatives that offer more nutrients, like honey and maple syrup.

As a Vermont gal, I love replacing white sugar with maple syrup. Not only does it contain important minerals like calcium, iron, zinc and manganese, but it’s less processed than granulated white sugar. White sugar is made in a factory, uses unsavory chemicals and is artificially whitened. Maple syrup is simply boiled down sap from Maple trees. Plus it’s local, and it tastes better! Replacing white sugar with maple syrup makes me feel better about all the cookies I produce on cold winter nights. Unfortunately, it’s much more expensive than white sugar, and often doesn’t fit into many Vermonters’ food budgets.

Nearly 100,000 Vermonters rely on 3SquaresVT benefits to help put food on the table. 3SquaresVT, a federal nutrition program that’s known nationally as SNAP, is meant to supplement a household’s existing food budget to help people better afford nutritious food. Times are tough, however, and most 3SquaresVT participants don’t have any money left over after paying for other basic needs like rent, heat, and medicine, to put toward a food budget. Instead, their monthly 3SquaresVT benefit is all that they have to spend on food. The average benefit is only $1.72 per meal for each person. With $5 to spend a day on food there is little room for special treats like cookies, let alone replacing white sugar with maple syrup. At the grocery store, the more nutritious option is often the more expensive option. Chips, soda, and processed foods filled with white flour and white sugar are much less expensive than whole grains, vegetables, and lean meats. At Hunger Free Vermont, we want all Vermonters to be able to afford the healthy option. A nutritious diet helps kids learn better, helps adults work better, and can help households break out of poverty and be less dependent on benefit programs like 3SquaresVT. Increasing 3SquaresVT benefits would be a promising step toward helping Vermonters afford nutritious foods. Unfortunately, these days Congress is more focused on cutting benefits than increasing them. While we work to protect, and someday improve, 3SquaresVT, a healthy cookie does wonders to lift my spirits and sustain my coworkers. Carrot Oatmeal Cookies are simple to make and are full of whole grains, vegetables, nuts, and yes, maple syrup.

Carrot Oatmeal Cookies (recipe from 101cookbooks.com)

Ingredients:

1 cup whole wheat pastry flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon sea salt

1 cup rolled oats

2/3 cup chopped walnuts

1 cup shredded carrots

½ cup real maple syrup, room temperature

½ cup unrefined (fragrant) coconut oil, warmed until just melted

1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger

Preheat oven to 375F degrees and line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

In a large bowl whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, and oats. Add the nuts and carrots. In a separate smaller bowl use a whisk to combine the maple syrup, coconut oil, and ginger. Add this to the flour mixture and stir until just combined.

Drop onto prepared baking sheets, one level tablespoonful at a time, leaving about 2 inches between each cookie. Bake in the top 1/3 of the oven for 10 - 12 minutes or until the cookies are golden on top and bottom.

Makes about 2 1/2 dozen cookies.